The Vanity of the Smug

You would not think a man would be shot

For a simple broken taillight.

You would not think a police officer would

shoot a man in the back in cold-blooded murder.

I did not know that broken taillights and running away in fear

were crimes punishable by death

and carried out by one man

as judge, jury and executioner, but

apparently in some parts of this country this is so,

especially if the officer is white

and the person who was murdered commits the crime

of being poor and black.

And the Smug Man Stands

over the dead man with his hands on his hips

and a shield on his breast,

and lies once again.

But this time,

This Time

His shield does not protect!

His shield does not keep him from the consequences of his lie,

because of an ordinary man

and his video camera

Which records the truth

and reveals the lie.

And a nation rises up and says, NO MORE!

And the people rise up and scream, NO MORE!

I do not want to see what I see.

I do not want to believe what I see.

I want to turn away.

I do not want to watch that man being gunned down.

I want to turn the channel and see something nice.

But therein lies the problem.

We need to LOOK!

WE need to see!

We need to see IT!

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 10, 2015)

NaPoWriMo 2015 / 30  Poems in 30 Days

I Don't Know Whether

I don’t know whether

It’s the weather

That moves me to wrote poetry,

Or moves me to climb a tree!

If I had some feathers

I would not mind the weather.

I could perch outside in a tree,

Or fly above the canopy!

And I would not wonder whether

It would be snow, or rain, or sunny weather,

I’d just take flight with all my feathers

In whatever weather!

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 10, 2015)

National Poetry Writing Month/ 30 Poems in 30 Days 2015

Monday Morning Aubade on a Spring Day in Maine

You wake me and I bandage your toe,

me in my night gown, you already dressed,

I put my glasses on, and shake cobwebs from my brain.

It’s a cold, mostly gray, spring day,

and the sparrows are filling the yard with song.

With my brief glance out the picture window that overlooks the bay

I see the tide slipping out.

It is as if a great silvery silk curtain

with eiders embroidered on its surface

is slowly and steadily being drawn back.

But back to your toe, the infected one,

I clean and bandage it

You dress your feet,

We have a brief embrace at the kitchen door,

then off you go to work

as the lemony sun slides up from the horizon only to disappear

in the shrouded sky,

while I grab my pen to write.

This is our morning good-bye—a tender routine after 38 years.

Tomorrow the details will be different, but the love will be the same.

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 6, 2015)

aubade-music suitable to greeting the dawn or morning; a song about two lovers parting at dawn.

Prompt 6 from the NaPoWriMo / 30 Poems in 30 Days website

At Last

At last the warm air drifted in

after a long, cold and bitter winter

a day when birds landed in droves

and fresh warm air filled the land.

I, breathing the scent of that warmth,  

cast off my chores for the day,

and stayed outside.

All day.

It was as if I had been released from a long imprisonment.

I walked through mud that sucked at my shoes.

I listened to the trickle of melting snow as it formed puddles around me.

The music of song sparrows drifted over the wet, melting earth

—a song of joy to me!

And then in the evening, as dusk settled like a fawn to the ground,

the peenting of woodcocks was heard

and the winnowing of their wings in an eager mating flight display

and I stood in the yard, my mouth agape,

Listening to the music of spring—at last!

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 4, 2015)

NaPoWriMo/ 30 Poems in 30 Days

The Old Red Barn

There is a place of dreams,

an old red barn with memories

of my grandfather who was

and now is not,

Buried beneath a granite slab

with Nana now by his side.

How do I recall the days that were?

With him walking the earth

With him feeding the cows

With him cutting the hay

With him in his chair silently puffing his pipe

With him fishing along the banks of Black Ledge Creek

With him rushing out the door during Christmas dinner, donning his fireman’s hat as he went.

With him that one and only time he let me help pluck the feathers from the warm breast of a pheasant he had shot—a task usually reserved for his grandsons.

And we stood behind the old red barn

Where his fishing boat stayed in the winter

Only to be towed back to Moosehead Lake in Maine the next summer

To the place of his dreams and deep desires,

the place he brought his bride to all those long years ago,

the place that he loved,

the place of his being,

the place that he died one summer.

But the old red barn is empty now

Save for his memory

or his ghost.

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 1, 2015)

Maine is Not

Maine is not Arizona.

It does not have saguaros and ocotillos and cacti

You cannot wear flip flops all year round.

You cannot grow oranges in Maine.

There are no nectar feeding bats in Maine,

and the fragrance of creosote bush does not perfume the air after the rain.

There is no song of the desert toad singing its wild mating cry during the monsoon.

In Maine there are not ten kinds of hummingbirds flying around.

In fact, in Maine, only one species is found!

Maine is not sunny, day after day after day.

Maine is not flat and dusty and dry,

Maine is not landlocked.

Maine is not predictable,

Maine is not tame.

Maine is not crowded or bustling or boring.

You cannot escape nature in Maine.

You cannot drive very far in a straight line,

and in Maine, “You can’t get there from here.”

In summer you cannot stay outside too long because of humidity, mosquitoes, black flies, and ticks.

In winter you cannot stay outside because of snow and ice and below zero temperatures

with high, gusty winds to drive the point home.

Maine does not have rattlesnakes, scorpions, or tarantulas.

Maine does not have Spanish style houses.

There is no place else like Maine.

Maine is not Arizona.

~Kathie Adams Brown (April 1, 2015)

Messalonskee Lake in Maine 6-23-14

NaPoWriMo 2015 / 30 Poems in 30 Days

Day One Prompt: A Poem of Negation

Regrets

Santa Rita Mountains in Arizona 8-7-2010

I guess it’s too late to be a ballerina, lithe, graceful and pretty.

I guess it’s too late to own my own horse and ride wildly over the fields.

I guess it’s too late to build a log cabin, all from scratch with my own trees and on my own land.

I guess it’s too late to live in the mountains, far away from anyone or anything.

I guess it’s too late to live in Idaho, a place more wild and beautiful than I could have imagined.

I guess it’s too late to be an Indian princess and live in a teepee and wear a buckskin dress and moccasins.

I guess it’s too late to become a doctor and practice in some faraway place where I am most needed.

I know it’s too late to save my poor dog, the beautiful Irish Setter—poetry in motion. I let him down. He was my friend. He was my heart.

But it is never too late to sing my own song, or write my own story.

It is never too late to love, or forgive,

or to dream.

~ Kathie Adams Brown (4-1-15)